Summary of recommendations
It is recommended that:
Overarching
- The Australian and Northern Territory Governments Governments recognise as a matter of urgent national significance the continuing need to address the unacceptably high level of disadvantage and social dislocation being experienced by Aboriginal Australians living in remote communities throughout the Northern Territory.
- In addressing these needs both governments acknowledge the requirement to reset their relationship with Aboriginal people based on genuine consultation, engagement and partnership.
- Government actions affecting the aboriginal communities respect Australia's human rights obligations and conform with the Racial Discrimination Act 1975.
Welfare reform and employment
Income management
- The current blanket application of compulsory income management in the Northern Territory cease.
- Income management be available on a voluntary basis to community members who choose to have some of their income quarantined for specific purposes, as determined by them.
- Compulsory income management should only apply on the basis of child protection, school enrolment and attendance and other relevant behavioural triggers. These provisions should apply across the Northern Territory.
- All welfare recipients to have access to external merits review.
- Centrelink conduct field interviews with individuals to explain changes to income management to ensure that those who wish to remain on income management can do so with administrative ease.
Community stores
- The system for licensing community stores be continued with a requirement for there to be an audit of each licensed store every six months to ensure:
- high standards of governance and financial integrity
- good quality and range of products
- appropriate health standards
- a local employment strategy to increase the number of Aboriginal employees in community stores.
- The Australian Government Examine ways to address the unacceptably high prices that continue to be found in community stores notwithstanding the licensing arrangements.
Employment
- The Community Develop Employment Projects (CDEP) program be reformed in tandem with an overhaul of training provided in Aboriginal communities so that CDEP participants must undergo literacy, numeracy and on-the-job training designed to improve non-CDEP employment opportunities.
- Community Employment Brokers (CEBs)should :
- focus on mentoring, case management and training support particularly with CDEP participants
- undertake workplace assessment
- coordinate activities between education and training providers and Job Network Providers.
Law and order
Alcohol, drugs and pornography
- The NTER laws prohibiting the possession and transportation of alcohol on prescribed lands be maintained.
- Alcohol supply, demand and harm reduction strategies be implemented urgently to ensure the sustainability and long-term success of the alcohol restriction measures.
- Comprehensive alcohol management plas be finalised in all relevant communities.
- Strengthened measures be put in place as a matter of urgency to address illicit drug use in remote Aboriginal communities and associated mental health issues.
- Current signage advertising about alcohol and pornography restrictions should be modified in consultation with communities to determine appropriate location, design and wording, where this has not already occurred.
Police
- The overall number of police in Northern Territory Aboriginal communities be significantly increased and put on a more secure footing through:
- the existing 18 THEMIS police stations being made permanent
- similar police stations being established in other Aboriginal communities with substantial populations
- an emphasis on recruiting more female police officers.
- The Australian and Northern Territory Governments agree, as soon as possible, a standard for policing levels in remote communities which delivers effective and equitable police numbers, is transparent and provides certainty for Aboriginal people.
- the governments further agree to work towards achieving the standard over an agreed timeframe.
- In parallel with increased police numbers, there be an emphasis on quality community policing with police officers receiving relevant training and development before deployment to an Aboriginal community.
Additional legal services for Indigenous Australians
- The Australian and Northern Territory Governments assess the impact of additional police and other law enforcement measures on the Northern Territory justice system, and ensure there are sufficient resources to handle any increased pressure, including reasonable access to courthouses and other essential legal services.
Aboriginal Interpreter Services
- Australian and Northern Territory Government agencies encourage their staff to use interpreter services as a priority, on a fee for service basis.
- A local emplyment strategy be developed to increase the number of Aboriginal people employed as interpreters.
- The Northern Territory Government to consider transferring responsibility for the Aboriginal Interpreter Service to the Department of the Chief Minister signalling the importance of this issue.
Enhancing education
- The Australian and Northern Territory Governments acknowledge and move urgently in a sustained way to address the serious crisis in education in Northern Territory remote Aboriginal communities.
Supporting families
- The Northern Territory Government engage immediately with Aboriginal communities to strengthen child protection arrangements and deal with reported cases of child abuse.
- Funding priority be given to enable Aboriginal communities to build community integration and ownership of a child and community safety system that has the capacity to interface effectively with government agencies
- to be implemented through community safety plans which link police, child protection, teachers, health staff, Government Business Managers and other key service providers, with relevant community organisations such as night patrols, safe houses and women's groups
- the community safety plans should ensure that programs and services directed at child safety and wellbeing are appropriate and relevant to the community and have a high level of visibility and transparency
- the community safety plans become a core element of the place-based agreements.
- Where safe houses have been installed Northern Territory Government, the relevant service provider and each community agree about their management, duty of care, liability and integration with associated services before they become operational, and as further safe houses are installed there be consultation with the relevant community on these issues.
- A comprehensive strategy be developed and implemented for youth development services addressing both capital infrastructure and recurrent funding, linked to a wider community development framework.
Improving child and family health
- The intergovernmental funding agreement—Expanding Health Service Delivery Initiative—be made a permanent feature of health funding to the Northern Territory and integrated into the tripartite collaboration arrangement involving Aboriginal Medical Services Alliance of the Northern Territory (AMSANT), the Australian Government and the Northern Territory Government.
- The Expanding Health Service Delivery Initiative be expanded to include Alcohol and Other Drug (AOD) and mental health funding.
- Urgent priority be given to the ongoing treatment of children with health issues identified in the Child Health Checks with a particular focus on dental treatment.
Housing and land reform
Five-year leases
- The Australian Government ensure the expeditious payment of just terms compensation to Aboriginal landowners for the acquisition and use of their property without their consent from the date of the original acquisition.
- The Australian Government pay rent to the Aboriginal owners of the land subject to the five-year leases.
Permits
- The permit system under the Aboriginal Land Rights (Northern Territory) Act 1976 be reinstated to control general public access to the townships on Aboriginal land and that the provisions be effectively policed. This requirement be embedded as one element of a community safety plan.
Coordination
- An Operations Centre continue under civillian management with the necessary authority and delegation from Prime Minister and Chief Minister to drive and coordinate implementation across both Australian and Northern Territory Government agencies delivering services to Aboriginal communities.
- The senior government official at the community level to report directly and be accountable to the Operations Centre.
- The title of the community-based senior government official be changed from Government Business Manager (GBM) to Community Development Manager.
Re-engagement
- The Australian and Northern Territory Governments endorse the need to reset the relationship with Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory and move in partnership to develop and maintain a community development framework within which a genuine engagement with communities can develop and be maintained.
- Roth governments commit to the reform of the machinery and culture of government to enable a more effective whole-of-government approach to be delivered on the ground and to support professional development for their key personnel located in Aboriginal communities.
Funding arrangements
- Unmet service needs and infrastructure backlogs in remote Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory be quantified and addressed as a matter of urgency.
- The Australian Governments Indigenous-specific expenditure to the Northern Territory for this purpose be excluded from the Commonwealth Grants Commission's assessments of the distribution of GST revenues required to achieve fiscal equalisation.
- Local government and financial assistance from the Commonwealth be reformed, instituting a new formula that assesses actual funding assistance needs in remote areas and accounting for the absence of rateable land in many Aboriginal communities.
- To maximise service delivery outcomes from the new regional and local partnership agreements, pooled funding arrangements between the Commonwealth and the states (and within each government) be adopted when multiple agencies are involved with accountability for expenditure against the outcomes specified in the agreements.
- Any pooled arrangements have clear outcome targets and timeframes across all elements with a pool manager responsible for the achievement of the targets and coordination of initiatives on the ground.
Governance, agreement making and capacity building
- The Australian and Northern Territory Governments work in partnership to develop, in consultation with Aboriginal communities, supporting programs and structures to enhance Aboriginal governance bodies at local and regional levels that will enable communities to achieve their cultural, political, economic and social development goals.
- Priority be given to capacity building for Aboriginal leadership and Aboriginal governance at the local community level.
- Governments should not impose requirements concerning particular models of governance on communities, other than that they must be capable of getting things done effectively and of holding decision makers accountable.
- Local and regional partnership agreements, negotiated equitably between the communities and governments, should be the basis for determining and organising the delivery of services, housing and essential infrastructure to remote communities.
- The agreement be developed through a process which engages communities in culturally appropriate ways and made subject to the informed consent of the relevant communities.
- To enable there to be a a manageable number of partnership agreements negotiated and implemented, it may be preferable to allow a mixed system of regional agreements and local community agreements.
Data and evaluation
- Government establish an authoritative database as a single integrated information system that enables regular measurement of outcomes of all government agency programs and services that target Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory.